Pumpkin Head Mohair Leech

~By: Lance Dean | May 21, 2017

The heads of Pumpkin Heads don't need to be limited to only orange.

I learned to tie the Mohair Leech from Mike Andreasen while visiting the Wasatch Fly Tying Expo a couple years ago. After watching him play with his Mohair yarn to create a slim leech pattern, I decided to buy the DVD and book he had sitting at the table he was tying at. Mike Andreasen’s Favorite Big Fish Lake Flies includes eight patterns tied by Mike Andreasen. The flies Mike tie are:

• Canadian Brown Mohair Leech
• Pumpkin Head
• California Leech
• EM
• Purple Beaver
• Mark’s Minnow
• Zonker Flash Minnow
• Zonker

I enjoyed watching Mike tie these flies and enjoyed tying them as well. My three favorite are the Canadian Brown Mohair Leech, EM, and the Purple Beaver.

Mike Andreasen also has two books available, titled “Effective Lake Flies A Float Tubing Guide to Productive Patterns”. This book includes 82 patterns. One of which is the Mohair Leech. Mike’s second book is titled “Productive Stillwater Flies”. It has eighty more patterns. These are both great books for someone looking for Stillwater patterns or ideas to create their own. Mike has a second DVD available as well. It is just as informative as his first. During his second DVD, Mike ties seven more patterns. To purchase either of Mike DVDs or Books go to: FishNFloat

This Rainbow fell victim to the Pumpkin Head

My latest successful fishing trip using the Pumpkin Head Mohair Leech was last weekend. The warm air and cool water made the trout active. As I looked into the water I watched the fish cruise up and down the shoreline. My third cast with a fast sinking line on a 9’ 5x leader with a Pumpkin Head Mohair Leech tied at the end brought in a hard fighting Rainbow that chomped on my Mohair Pumpkin Head Leech with a vengeance.

Tying the Pumpkin Head Mohair Leech is pretty straight forward. Pull your Mohair strands from the core of the yarn to create a small clump that will form the tail. After you tie in the tail, tie in the Mohair yarn at the back of the fly and wrap the Mohair Yarn around the shank of the hook until you only have roughly twenty percent of the hook shank remaining. When you tie off and trim the Mohair yarn dub your thread with some florescent orange synthetic dubbing. I like UV Ice Dub. Wrap the dubbing around the shank to the head of the fly and whip finish. See, pretty simple.

Mohair Yarn is a simple and sparse yarn that utilizes a three strand a core. The Mohair fibers can be pulled from the core to create a Mohair dubbing. Mohair Yarn is a pretty cool material that can be utilized in many ways, including dubbing, tails fibers, or bodies of flies. Canadian Brown in particular has some unique properties. The color Canadian Brown is created by using many different colors of Mohair fibers and what is even cooler is that none of the fibers are brown. It’s the combination of these colors that give it its brown tint.

Mohair Pumpkin Head and a Simi Seal Pumpkin Head

The only issue with tying tying the Mohair Leech it is finding Canadian Brown Mohair Yarn. Canadian Brown Mohair Yarn is not an easy material to find and I think that it is going to get harder as time goes on. My solution to this problem is to use AZ Simi Seal Dubbing instead. Just know that if you use Simi Seal Dubbing to tie this leech it is probably more of a Pumpkin Head Simi Seal Leech rather than a Mohair Pumpkin Head Leech. Feel free to try different colors as the head of the Pumpkin Head, but here is a tip, use the rusty brown thread for the body of the fly and then whip finish and tie some new thread for the head that matches the dubbing of the head on your Pumpkin Head.

Please enjoy this demonstration of me tying these two versions of the Pumpkin Head. And as usual please follow fishbaitsflybox.com by clicking HERE. “Like” Fishbait’s Fly Box on Facebook by clicking HERE and subscribe to Fishbait’s Fly Box on YouTube by clicking HERE and then click subscribe.

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